Jul 8, 2019
How To Overcome Resistance.
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That feeling of resistance you feel when you’re starting to go outside your comfort zone is inevitable. But you CAN overcome it.
It’s part of the process.
Right now it probably feels like a heavy, negative feeling, full of emotion and all the things you’re making it mean. All the negative thoughts of ‘who are you to do this’ and ‘you think someone would actually pay you THAT?’
Not only allll the thoughts, but all the distractions and excuses. All the ways you can NOT actually do the things you’re trying to.
The fear, the overwhelm, the blame, the excuses, the overthinking everything, the second guessing and doubting yourself.
It’s that icky transition stage between where you’re at right now and where you’re going.
It feels like an internal tug of war with part of you wanting to do something and another part literally doing everything in its power to stop you...but they’re both you!
But is it REALLY you?
Understand this isn’t actually you just having a negative dialogue with a really freaking mean person in your own head.
It’s part of the process of your brains misguided attempt to keep you safe. It’s afraid of change and trying to keep you where you are so you don’t try to change anymore.
That’s its goal, for things to go back to exactly how they were.
It’s heavily linked to your unconscious beliefs and thought habits. So, if your conscious mind is saying ‘I want to do this’ but your unconscious is saying ‘hang on a minute you don’t believe you’re good enough to actually do this so i’ll remind you of that with all the thoughts that are going to stop you even trying’. You then have an internal battle on your hands.
You have a case of resistance.
Then it becomes harder and harder to actually get things done, procrastination is ruling your business, and you get more and more frustrated with yourself because you just can’t understand why you’re not doing the things you know would help drive you forwards!
Annoying right?!
So how do you overcome resistance?
Firstly, accept that resistance is an inevitable part of growth.
You’re certainly not the first and won’t be the last person to experience it. We all struggle with it from time to time.
No matter what stage of your business you’re at. New level, new devil.
There’s no magic pill that makes it go away. So don’t beat yourself up when you do feel it and allow yourself to LEARN from it.
It’s more of a case of learning to recognise resistance, and then asking it to dance and you deciding who leads.
Awareness, as with anything, is the first key to changing it.
Recognising and acknowledging that’s what’s going on is the quickest way to push through it. From there you get to choose and make the decision to (in the words of Nike…) Just do it!
Just the awareness and acknowledgement of it takes away its emotional power over you and puts the control back in your hands.
Exercise
I have an exercise for you. Pick one task or goal that you know you need or want to do but just can’t seem to get yourself to.
Write it down. Now, list ALL the reasons you can’t do it. Keep going until you can’t think of any more.
Look at the list. Now I want you to pretend you’re in a debate with someone else and come up with all the counter ways those things aren’t true.
Then pick out the core beliefs that you feel the most emotional draw to, that feel the most real to you and write the opposite of that to create a new, more empowering belief...that’s STILL realistic so you BELIEVE it and don’t just discount it.
So for example let’s take the age old ‘I don’t have time’. Your NEW belief becomes ‘I always find time for the things that are important to me’.
Believable, true, can’t really be argued with ...consciously or unconsciously!
Change the focus
Take the focus away from the resistance to why you’re doing what you’re doing. Losing sight of that all important reason you’re even doing it in the first place is a sure fire way to make it louder!
This is another reason that CLEAR and MEASURABLE goals are important. It needs to be compelling enough and have an emotional drive to keep up that motivation. That big vision you have, get as super clear on exactly what it looks like as you possibly can. Consistently remind your brain what you want, why you want it, what it looks like and what’s possible.
On the contrary, when you focus on the resistance the good old ‘what you focus on grows’ takes hold and that becomes the dominating force and what you’re essentially telling your brain to give you more evidence for. When you consciously shift the focus from that, to what it is your aiming for, the big vision. Then it will start to work WITH you to make that happen.
The way you think things are, are the way they WILL be. It’s a self perpetuating cycle that you’re training your brain into.
Check in with your values
Make sure what you’re doing in line with your values. Is this resistance to change in general and stepping outside of your comfort zone, or are you actually doing something that doesn’t sit right with you?
Change the voice.
When we’re listening to that inner mean voice it will take on the form of a particular person.
Some people hear it as their own voice, some people hear it in the voice of a critical parent or family member. Just start to notice it, then literally change the voice!
Imagine Micky mouse or Donald duck saying those things to you. Would it have such an emotional hold?
Would you be able to argue back to it more easily? Even laugh it off?
This process again breaks that emotional connection which is a big driver for keeping you stuck. It takes away that mean little voice’s power so you can consciously challenge what it’s saying.
My favourite book on the subject is Steven Pressfield's, The war of art. (Affiliate link) It's aimed specifically at writers but it really applies to anyone trying to achieve anything big and out of their comfort zone.
When you can push through the resistance, there is good news! Right on the other side of resistance is usually a breakthrough or some kind. A new skill, an uplevel, a limiting belief being broken. When you can start to see resistance as a GOOD thing, it becomes that much easier to deal with!
If you know that now is the time to start changing things for yourself and want to explore this further, have any questions or want some accountability to make sure you’re doing the things you need to then please book in a free discovery call so we can see what needs to happen to get you from where you’re at right now, to the successful business owner you know you can be!!
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